I was in the WoW Stress Test and since then been following the beta boards and read about this. Just for those who haven't been following it, it basically breaks down to this.....

Before this patch came to be, mana was regenerated every tick if you were casting or not(I believe a tick in WoW is 5 seconds(mana regen was based on your character's spirit)). Because of this, casters put Spirit as being a more important stat than Intelligence enhancing items. Intelligence having the effect of increasing your mana pool but having no effect on the rate mana regenerates at. As long as you regen mana fast enough, the size of your mana pool really wasn't important.

After the patch came to be, The effects of spirit were increased so mana(AND possibly health I believe(Health doesn't regen due to spirit while in combat(that was true before and after the patch))) would regenerate even faster than before, BUT now you don't start to regenerate mana for 5 seconds after you finish casting your last spell. Problem being that more often than not you, as a spell caster of any mana using class, cast often enough that you may actually not regenerate ANY mana during a fight.

While I hear a lot of whining on the boards, this is probably a good thing. Before intelligence was being almost completely ignored as a stat for a caster and not it's important, AS IT SHOULD BE! I think the real problem here is the resistance to change or what is being seen as a "nerf" when it is really a correction to make things as they were meant to be all along. The purpose of spirit seems to be to help decrease downtime between fights and THAT'S IT!. There is a reason you don't regenerate health during a fight. Now there is a reason you don't regenerate mana during a fight also. You CAN regenerate mana during a fight but it means actually medding a while without casting. Not only CAN you regenerate mana during a fight, but because the effects of spirit were effectively TRIPLED you can gain more mana faster than before. The cost though is not to cast for a short time.

People can say I don't know what I'm talking about because I'm not in the beta, but I think it's because I'm not in the beta and my character wasn't effected by this that I can be more detached and logically objective over this than someone who is playing and upset by the change.

Come release, to most people this will just be the way it is from the beginning because for them that WILL be the beginning, and it will be a very accepted thing. It has a definite purpose and it serves it. Now your mana pool matters and it really should have mattered. It's because it didn't that this change had to be.

I think the smartest thing Blizzard did was start a new beta server NOW, after the patch. Reasoning is now new players will come to the game after this change and they will be able to see it in effect from the "beginning". The new server is just that, a new beginning. Now that Hunters are a class offered from when people first started playing(being the new testers invited to play), I think you will see them more welcomed in groups than on the older servers. On the older servers Hunters are a relatively new class, one that people did without for a long time so once they came to be, no one wanted them in groups because they did fine without them before.

My main reason for writing this is because this is an insight I had into this change and I just can't post it on the beta sight because it's beta testers only. I'd hope a beta tester might link this to the official sight as I think it is a reasonable insight to the change and might help people better understand the reason behind it.

Btw, let me know how this patch helped Hunter's pet's DPS. Before they were little more than meat shields with no DPS. I know Blizzard doesn't want Hunters to be over-powered, but the pets definitely needed to be dealing more damage(That was my class during the stress test obviously. I didn't have any problem grouping during that time btw as that was also a "new beginning" as I was talking about before, but I've been following people's threads about the Hunters).

Edited, Wed Sep 22 00:14:26 2004 by KerikDaven

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I'd challenge you to a battle of witts, but I don't fight unarmed opponents.

While I have no problem with the 5 second regen buffer, saying that spirit is only meant for between battles is wrong. That's what food and drink are for.

I have a 44 Hunter. Hunters are still basically worthless in groups, as their utility is basically nil and the DPS they do isn't as much as a rogue or mage who also have better utility (sap, sheep, mage AE, etc.) Now, I don't really have a problem getting a group, but if I were looking to get a group together, hunter is the absolute last class I would look for.

Luckily, other people don't seem to realize how not-that-great hunters are, or are just having pity on poor little me.

Well, playing a Hunter, I'm sure you know the class isn't finished and that they are still tuning it. Pet DPS is supposed to have gone up, NO talents are in yet, so while I myself plan to play a Hunter, I really don't see it as a useless class, merely an incomplete class. Once properly tuned I'm thinking it will be a better than average class. Like it or not, the pet needs a reasonable DPS itself which it didn't have and Blizzard is working on fixing. I think when Hunter was released they wanted to keep it tame to start with and build it up from there rather than starting too powerful and THEN having to nerf it.

I'm sure Spirit has other purposes, but as it is now I'm not certain what they are. Also keep in mind that I'm not playing anymore so really don't get to see what that is. Food and Drink are ALSO for between battles.

I really liked the Hunter "as-is" when I played it and am really look forward to seeing how they improve it. Pet damage was my only real concern at the time. Maybe if I'd played other classes first I wouldn't feel the same but I'm doubting that. While my server was down I did make a Rogue on another server. While the Rogue was cool, it just wasn't what I really wanted to play.

Peace.

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I'd challenge you to a battle of witts, but I don't fight unarmed opponents.

While I hear a lot of whining on the boards, this is probably a good thing. Before intelligence was being almost completely ignored as a stat for a caster

Intelligence was always favored by mages, who could summon their own drinks for between combat, and could blow anything out of the sky by simply burning through their mana.

The class this change hurts the most are priests, whose casts are reactionary. A mage can wait 10 seconds and then cast 3 nukes in quick sequence. A priest has to heal when people are hurt, notwithstanding anything else they might want to toss in they'll need to lump in with their heal. I tried playing around this principle solo and partnered with a warrior, and the feel of the game in trying to do that is just plain weird. If I don't go out of my way to not cast for a while, I am simply out of mana, and the group isn't going to want to wait for me to drink just because I "can't manage my mana." (And that claim is valid, whether I like it or not.)

Before intelligence was (not useful)...not (sic) it's important, AS IT SHOULD BE!

Intelligence makes sense as a key stat for mages and warlocks, but I would think spirit would be a more significant statistic for druids, priests, shamans, and paladins.

The purpose of spirit seems to be to help decrease downtime between fights and THAT'S IT!. There is a reason you don't regenerate health during a fight. Now there is a reason you don't regenerate mana during a fight also. You CAN regenerate mana during a fight but it means actually medding a while without casting. Not only CAN you regenerate mana during a fight, but because the effects of spirit were effectively TRIPLED you can gain more mana faster than before. The cost though is not to cast for a short time.

This is wrong in so many ways.

The purpose of spirit is to help your ability to recuperate after strenuous periods - call it "will" if you like. It was not so you can sit on the sidelines and do nothing for 1 minute rather than 1.5 to regain your mana, when you can just drink and get it back in 20 seconds. And that IS the official purpose of food/drink in the game, as per Blizzard.

You don't regenerate health in combat because mobs don't, and mobs don't because that was a super-annoying aspect of EQ I imagine the dev's wanted to escape.

The effects of spirit were more than tripled, actually. However, I have gone entire battles where, because of triggered casting, (meaning things happened that prompted me to resort to a spell,) I have not regen-ed anything at all, and either my groupmates went on to another fight relatively quickly (because they didn't see me on the ground drinking - I was regenerating instead!) or I was solo and didn't feel like waiting around all day for mana I should have had already.

The "cost" is to not cast at all. You don't seem to realize just how long five seconds is in a fight. My usual solo demeanor previously was to melee, and cast a particular spell as it refreshed, which had a cooldown timer of 8 seconds. Now if I do that, I'm basically nixing all mana regen altogether. The two alternatives are two cast my other nuke which is *horribly* mana inefficient, or to just melee, which is *horribly* time inefficient and still forces me to heal mid-fight, which is a spell.

Come release, to most people this will just be the way it is from the beginning because for them that WILL be the beginning, and it will be a very accepted thing. It has a definite purpose and it serves it. Now your mana pool matters and it really should have mattered. It's because it didn't that this change had to be.

Just because you are naive as a new player doesn't mean that "the way things are" is right. It has no definite purpose that I can understand. Mana pool has always mattered - it mattered even more last patch than before when spirit was nerfed (as a supposed bug.) Now that spirit is back to what it was, despite the removal of combat drinking that was the real issue, all this does is force me to continue to not even consider spirit as a worthwhile statistic in this game, and SERIOUSLY affect my strategy -- in fact, I would dare say it removes strategy from this game because when I cast a spell, I say "omg I need to keep casting stuff while I'm not gaining anything already."

People can say I don't know what I'm talking about because I'm not in the beta, but I think it's because I'm not in the beta and my character wasn't effected by this that I can be more detached and logically objective over this than someone who is playing and upset by the change.

I can see how you might think this is a legitimate argument, and in some cases it would be, but in this particular case your lack of knowledge outweights your unbiased objectivity.

For what it's worth, I started a new character on the beta 2 server, which I have gotten to level 14 thus far, also a priest. I reasoned with all the changes, it might not be a bad idea to start fresh, at least for practice's sake. The low-end game is WAY harder than it was before due to this change. Inexperienced players are going to be dying way more than necessary, whereas before the newbie areas had a good balance. As it is, I'm having trouble playing my class, and I know what I'm doing!

Additionally, I should add that this strongly facilitates the use of two or more healers in rotation during a difficult encounter. There are one-group battles of this nature - you don't need a raid for this to occur. And the maximum group size is 5. So this change is also implicitly forcing players to fill 2 of their 5 slots with a healing class, one with a tank, and one with a DPS/CC class. So the group has 2 {priest, druid or shaman}, 1 warrior, 1 {mage or rogue} and that leaves everyone else begging for the last slot. Why even play a hunter, warlock or paladin? The last spot is for DPS, and those classes are less desirable for that role.

So basically, what I'm saying is, this change forces even more class balance issues on the players than previously existed. What was earlier considered implicit by the players has now become explicit.

The five second rule just increased downtime for casters. You just adapt to it and everything is fine. Instead of all out nuking with my mage now, I end fights with my staff. Mana is regenerating so much faster now it evens out.

Mages may have used int builds on PvE server, but on PvP server most high level mages used +dam gear. This change will cause alot of those mages to change to +int.

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"Ahh, and it begins, promises not met to rush the game out...." -Stabbed

"It's the standard Blizzard operating procedure; make something suck, then make a talent to make it suck less." -Gigashadow

I think you should still regen during battle but not like you did before. Also the 5 second rule really hurts warlocks because it applies to their summons so the imp and others run out of mana too quick.

The class this change hurts the most are priests, whose casts are reactionary. A mage can wait 10 seconds and then cast 3 nukes in quick sequence. A priest has to heal when people are hurt, notwithstanding anything else they might want to toss in they'll need to lump in with their heal.

In a good group the main tank is taking the majority of the damage, they shouldn't be needing heals as fast as the caster can cast them or your group is in over their heads. This is where the mana pool(Intelligence) becomes important. With a larger mana pool you can go longer without going oom. You also don't HAVE to be casting. As the Mage player stated, they are mixing it up melee style and ALSO regaining mana, that's a very realistic and more fun approach for the priest to use too. Many Cleric types like playing the "Battle Cleric" role.

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Intelligence makes sense as a key stat for mages and warlocks, but I would think spirit would be a more significant statistic for druids, priests, shamans, and paladins.

Spirit is for mana and health regeneration only, This is not Everquest and Spirit isn't a renamed "Wisdom". ALL spell caster classes mana pools are Intelligence based. See.... http://www.worldofwarcraft.com/info/basics/characters.shtml...that's it for Spirit. You tried to dispute my view of the purpose of Spirit, so if you have anything that really better disputes my view, other than your word, please link it. Till then I'll listen to Blizzard's take on it. As far as my saying it's for between battles, it currently seems to be(since health isn't regenerating during battle and the regeneration of mana is restricted0 so I feel I had it detailed correctly. As far as food and drink, I agree with you. Spirit is basically "free" regen though where food and drink must be bought, looted or crafted through cooking. Food and drink are also the prefferred method since they are much faster.

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Just because you are naive as a new player doesn't mean that "the way things are" is right. It has no definite purpose that I can understand.

Just because you are naive as a beta player and don't understand the purpose for the way things are now doesn't make them wrong. Spirit was being used in place of intelligence by many players. Because of this, things had to change to make intelligence more important and the stat it was meant to be. You must adapt to the way things are. Now that this change is in place they will see how casting is effected. There is a STRONG chance they may re-evaluate the costs of certain spells and lower their casting cost to set things more in line with the way they want them. This change had to come first though before they could do that.

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I can see how you might think this is a legitimate argument, and in some cases it would be, but in this particular case your lack of knowledge outweighs your unbiased objectivity.

Actually I think my knowledge is just fine. Besides having actually played the game(though only for a short period), I have a brother who has been in beta phase 1 since the beginning, and have also been following all the posts(official and player made) on just about everything I could want to know about. I think perhaps your bias may be limiting you in your objectivity.

The point I am making about the release is that new players won't be bogged down with thoughts about how this 5 secs "messed things up" and will just accept it as the way things are and adapt accordingly to making the best of it. Between now and then Blizzard with either cause Intelligence to add even more mana to your mana pool than it does now and/or lower the costs of spells.... so that you can have more versatility and not be as limited as you currently feel you are because of this change.

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what I'm saying is, this change forces even more class balance issues on the players than previously existed.

Once the mana issues are better sort out as I explained above, this won't be such an issue. I'm certain there is a further plan here and this is just part of the road to get there and not the end result itself.

Finally, if you don't agree, that's fine. I'll have my point of view and you'll have yours and we'll just have to agree to disagree. Please don't knock what I know though as you don't know me or what I know and you're just making foolish assumptions based on your preconceptions of who you think I am. You are making you ideas based on your point of view and I am getting my thoughts from having listened to well over 30 people's thoughts, feelings, fears, and insights on this particular topic. Not counting all the other topics I have been following.

Stumpy, I agree with you fully, you roll with the punches, adapt and move on. Cheers to you mate!

Jaefo, Actually I didn't ask how Hunters were doing, I only asked about the pet situation as I know this recent patch tuned pet damage a little. Hunters will count on their pets a lot and as talents are added, other pet trainable abilities are added, and pet damage is better tuned, Hunters will be a much more viable DPS class. I'm disappointed to hear you being so negative about the class though. It needs work and isn't finished and everyone knows this. To expect miracles now is just silly. If it really bothers you, you might want to put it on the side and wait till it's better tweaked rather than suffer playing a class you aren't enjoying.

Peace out everyone, keep the posts coming. I enjoy other points of view even if I disagree with them. It all makes the world go 'round.

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I'd challenge you to a battle of witts, but I don't fight unarmed opponents.

Actually I didn't ask how Hunters were doing, I only asked about the pet situation as I know this recent patch tuned pet damage a little.

They upped it a bit. It's still not that great.

KerikDaven wrote:

I'm disappointed to hear you being so negative about the class though. It needs work and isn't finished and everyone knows this. To expect miracles now is just silly. If it really bothers you, you might want to put it on the side and wait till it's better tweaked rather than suffer playing a class you aren't enjoying.

I was explaining the hunter situation. I was not being negative. I'm not expecting miracles, I'm just telling you how the class is right now. Even with pet abilities and talents I don't see the class being that much of an asset to a group. I'm also enjoying playing my hunter plenty fine, thanks. You assume much.

I have a 44 Hunter. Hunters are still basically worthless in groups, as their utility is basically nil and the DPS they do isn't as much as a rogue or mage who also have better utility (sap, sheep, mage AE, etc.) Now, I don't really have a problem getting a group, but if I were looking to get a group together, hunter is the absolute last class I would look for.

Luckily, other people don't seem to realize how not-that-great hunters are, or are just having pity on poor little me.

I'm sure 3 months after the game we'll be making our comments about the way the same should work as well. Because I have such an interest in the game though I keep an eye on the state of the game as it is now. As everyone knows it's still changing. In the case of the 5 second cast rule, a lot of people are complaining about its effect on them but I'm really not hearing anyone trying to figure out why Blizzard did it. This post is actually an attempt to figure the reasoning behind it in support of Blizzard. It's not that I'm a "fanboy" of Blizzard, I just feel there is a purpose behind it more than just "we felt like doing it". To me it feels like step-one in a number of changes that will be made to make Intelligence matter more than it did before. While it is speculation, it comes from a strong logical deduction that Blizzard knows what they are doing here and has a purpose. The problem is no one is thinking past this change and merely complaining about it.

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I'd challenge you to a battle of witts, but I don't fight unarmed opponents.

Hehehe, my previous comment was not just directed to you. Then again, I must be grumpy...Dammit, I feel like an old man now...

Personally, I won't comment on things that I haven't even tried yet so meh. Charge was a different issue though. Oh how I hated that Charge - Hamspring -Charge combo *cough* thats another subject.

All I have to say is that in certain situations, its better if we actually experienced changes first hand then stand in the sidelines and call on it. My opinion, take it as you will. Good thing the release day is creeping closer and closer...

On a side note, however, I will say that I do like this 5 second rule. Keeps chain casters at bay which makes me happy during pvp and keeps mages busy choosing the right spell for the right situation during pve.

I think with this rule, Melee players or hybrids have a little more of a chance against a caster whose mana pool was almost unending. Mana shouldn't be endless and should need to be managed to some extent.

You, me and everyone else just can't wait till the game is finally ready enough to ship. It's all good. I'm an old crab myself sometimes(Part of the reason my Hunter pet was a Crab(which I named "Cancer" after my zodiac sign)). It's all good.

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I'd challenge you to a battle of witts, but I don't fight unarmed opponents.

In a good group the main tank is taking the majority of the damage, they shouldn't be needing heals as fast as the caster can cast them or your group is in over their heads. This is where the mana pool(Intelligence) becomes important. With a larger mana pool you can go longer without going oom. You also don't HAVE to be casting. As the Mage player stated, they are mixing it up melee style and ALSO regaining mana, that's a very realistic and more fun approach for the priest to use too. Many Cleric types like playing the "Battle Cleric" role.

So what you are saying is...when I'm in an instance, where the warrior is taking damage as fast as I do outside of an instance, I don't need to be healing him as often as I would heal myself outdoors, and I don't even need to be healing at all? That'll get me kicked out of groups real quick.

Also, what happens when the warrior isn't taking the majority of the damage? It does happen on occasion, and I need to be prepared to compensate. Even the better players will inadvertently draw aggro occasionally, so you can't just say "your group should play better."

I know how to do the battle cleric role. (Never mind that caster weapons were nerfed this patch.) I will also use my wand for ranged damage rather than casting nukes. Trust me, I know all about being mana efficient.

Spirit is for mana and health regeneration only, This is not Everquest and Spirit isn't a renamed "Wisdom". ALL spell caster classes mana pools are Intelligence based. See.... http://www.worldofwarcraft.com/info/basics/characters.shtml...that's it for Spirit. You tried to dispute my view of the purpose of Spirit, so if you have anything that really better disputes my view, other than your word, please link it.

Directly from that page...

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Spirit (SPT) Increases Health and Mana regeneration. Spirit affects all characters' Mana and Hit Point regeneration rates in and out of combat. Spirit also increases your chance to ‘proc’ with weapons.

My emphasis. We've already discussed how HP don't and never have regenerated in combat, so clearly that "in and out" statement is directed at mana.

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Just because you are naive as a beta player and don't understand the purpose for the way things are now doesn't make them wrong.

You're going on the assumption that you DO understand the purpose for the way things are, and therefore provide the counterpoint. (My previous statement of this sort, btw, was the general 'you'. I wasn't singling out KerikDaven.)

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Once the mana issues are better sort out as I explained above, this won't be such an issue. I'm certain there is a further plan here and this is just part of the road to get there and not the end result itself.

There had better be, but Blizzard has yet to explain themselves.

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Finally, if you don't agree, that's fine. I'll have my point of view and you'll have yours and we'll just have to agree to disagree. Please don't knock what I know though as you don't know me or what I know and you're just making foolish assumptions based on your preconceptions of who you think I am.

I made my opinion on the basis of the content of your post, and particularly the part where you said your not being in the beta gives you some measure of authority. If you want to turn around and tell me you've had indirect access to the beta and read the boards systematically, yes that does change things somewhat, but the boards don't exactly paint the most accurate picture either, so I hope you're relying more on that indirect access for your information.

I'd post a longer, more constructive set of comments, but I need to run to class.

I didn't read it extensively, I just clicked on the blue to find Eno's response, and replied to it. (My response is on page 10 near the bottom, under the name Restandre.) Most posts that I saw don't seem to be reacting too positively though.

I made my opinion on the basis of the content of your post, and particularly the part where you said your not being in the beta gives you some measure of authority. If you want to turn around and tell me you've had indirect access to the beta and read the boards systematically, yes that does change things somewhat, but the boards don't exactly paint the most accurate picture either, so I hope you're relying more on that indirect access for your information.

You seem to keep taking things out of the context they were said and fitting them to your own meanings, or other meanings at the least....

I never said that by not being in the beta that I had any measure of authority. What I specifically said was that because I am not in the beta and my character is not being affected by this change I can be more detached from the change and not take it as an insult, nerf, or detriment to my playing and think more logically about why it was done. That's all. I'm really not sure where you're getting your ideas about what I'm saying, but you're saying things I never did.

Let's start from the beginning here.....

5 second cast rule was put into effect, why?

No one really seems to care about the why, simply what it did to them. Did it have a purpose? Or was it just done on a whim?

To answer that we have to look at the current state of the game. From what I've been seeing, MOST mana using players have been selecting items that enhanced their Spirit statistic over Intelligence enhancing items. Why are they doing this? Especially when they all know Intelligence is what determines how much mana they have. Simple... If you can regenerate mana fast enough, it doesn't really matter how big your mana pool is. With a high Spirit you get mana back as fast, or nearly as fast, as you are using it. Because of this fact, a high Intelligence is not important.

From Blizzard's point of view this is no good. Intelligence is supposed to be the most important stat for casting spells. All spell casters should be seeking to increase their Intelligence if they want to be good casters. If it's not important, then we have to make it important. How do you do that? Simple, you have to make the size of your mana pool more important. How do you do that? Simple, not let it regenerate as fast, or at all, during a fight. Now you will only be able to cast as many spells as your mana allows. If you have a larger mana pool, you can cast more spells. How do you get more mana? Simple, increase your Intelligence. To make up for the fact that you are not regenerating much,or any, mana during a fight, we will increase the regeneration of mana and health between fights by increasing the effects of Spirit. Lastly, we will even grant more mana per point of Intelligence. Now Intelligence is more important to casters, less Spirit is more effective(meaning that even if you lowered your Spirit by HALF, you'll still regenerate health and mana faster than you did before the patch) so you can swap out Spirit increasing items and swap in Intelligence enhancing items without reducing downtime. Now the game can still continue at a faster rate than most other games allow, and we have set the character's statistics to the way we originally envisioned them.

With these change though, they will have to monitor casting as a whole and see if it is working as intended. If the 5 second cast rule proves too restrictive in not allowing enough spells to be cast, then either: the casting costs of spells will have to be re-evaluated; the amount of mana granted by Intelligence increased; or the rule might have to be shortened by a second or two. IMHO though, the 5 second rule will stand. It's having the effect they were looking for and more likely than not they will alter the mana pool and/or casting costs.

That is the point of my post re-explained, and hopefully more easily understandable.

As far as the thread you linked, I've read that already myself, been following others as well. Thanks though. While you are right, the boards aren't the truest representation of the game, you can usually figure out the truth pretty easily. You just need to realize the difference between people whining and people making valid points. They generally aren't too hard to tell apart though.

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Quote:---- Spirit (SPT) Increases Health and Mana regeneration. Spirit affects all characters' Mana and Hit Point regeneration rates in and out of combat. Spirit also increases your chance to ‘proc’ with weapons. --

My emphasis. We've already discussed how HP don't and never have regenerated in combat, so clearly that "in and out" statement is directed at mana.

Perhaps health also regenerated during combat in alpha build, or it was their original vision of how it should work, but quickly changed it for reasons similar to the problem they are having with Intelligence. If health regenerated during combat, raising Stamina would be less important than raising Spirit. Obviously they are altering their original definition to mean out of combat for both now, or in the case of mana to a very limited amount of regeneration during combat.

I'd like to believe that I've convinced you that I have a good grasp of the current situation and the mechanics behind it even without actually playing. As I said though, I did play for 10 days during the Stress Test, and have been following everything on the boards since. Besides that, I've been playing RPGs since I was 8 and using computers since I was 12 and am now 34. The last 5 years I've been playing Everquest, have played Ultima Online, Anarchy Online and DAoC, so I have a pretty solid background in these kinds of games. Not to mention being in EQ2 and Matrix Online betas. Out of any game I've played online though WoW impresses me the most. Once I'm in any of the phases of beta(open, or if I can get myself into it, closed beta) I can see myself not playing another game other than WoW for many years to come(and just to cover it, yes, I'll still play retail release of WoW if I can't get into any of the phases of beta).

Last quote I'd like to address is...

Quote:

You're going on the assumption that you DO understand the purpose for the way things are, and therefore provide the counterpoint. (My previous statement of this sort, btw, was the general 'you'. I wasn't singling out KerikDaven.)

While I could be wrong, I do feel that the reasons I've stated are in fact the reasons behind the change. Thinking about it logically, this is at the least a very sound and plausible possibility. I did though take what you said as being directed more at me than being a generality as most of the post was directed at me(which wouldn't be unreasonable as I DID start this post :D )

Excuse my being a wise-*** in reply to your reply, but you kind of set the tone for that yourself. You seemed to take some of my post in ways not intended and also didn't give me credit for having a clue as to what I'm talking about. Deductive reasoning is a very powerful tool and that's mostly what I'm using here. A judge, lawyers, and jurors are not present at the scene of a crime, yet they find truth and reason from what was formerly abstract and chaotic. In this case the boards are my abstract and chaotic and I'm searching for the elements of truth in them. Granted, my grammar could be better but I've always been more math and science minded. :P

Mark my words though.... this "5 second rule" is not the end result but the first step of a few. They just want to change casting so that it will be more Intelligence based than Spirit based.

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I'd challenge you to a battle of witts, but I don't fight unarmed opponents.

PvE the change is easier to adapt to. Now that I've done a decent sized raid with the change...not so much. If you happen to survive long enough to run out of mana, which I did, you become a chearleader for at least thirty seconds to a minute.

My question is, in PvP and PvE with these changes, would you rather have more rogues than mages now, and shammies and druids than priests in raid groups. Rogues aren't mana dependant. Shammies and Druids both can do added DPS while waiting for mana to regen.

Balancing for both PvE and PvP, and solo v group v raid is not an easy thing to do. I hope Bliz can balance them all equally, but I doubt it. I'm not knocking Bliz, I don't think anyone can do it.

Mage and Priest are my favorite classes right now, but considering the majority of endgame will be raid or large group oriented, I wouldn't play either if release was tomorrow. Druid is looking better and better with the versatility they have.

As a side not, it would be funny to watch a mage and priest go at it melee because neither has any mana ^^

Also, I received another beta invite and I have no idea why. I ask a GM in game and he said they accidently sent them out to some existing beta testers. I have a friend that may want it. If not, I'll give it to someone on these forums.

Another point not brought up is that mobs don't follow the new rules given to players. Bad idea. If my warrior can't charge when in combat then a mob shouldn't be able to. While fighting Seers tonight with the new mage a rolled, they were regaining mana while we were fighting and I wasn't :(

Edited, Fri Sep 24 04:59:31 2004 by StumpyWSF

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"Ahh, and it begins, promises not met to rush the game out...." -Stabbed

"It's the standard Blizzard operating procedure; make something suck, then make a talent to make it suck less." -Gigashadow

Another point not brought up is that mobs don't follow the new rules given to players. Bad idea. If my warrior can't charge when in combat then a mob shouldn't be able to. While fighting Seers tonight with the new mage a rolled, they were regaining mana while we were fighting and I wasn't :(

No MMORPG has mobs that follow every single player rule. Otherwise the game wouldn't be varied, etc. etc. etc. and so forth.

No, you never said you had any measure of authority. But you did imply that your unbiased objectivity gave you a better position to talk from. I acknowledge that situationally that could be the case, but disagree with it in this instance.

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I'd like to believe that I've convinced you that I have a good grasp of the current situation and the mechanics behind it even without actually playing.

You have. I'm not trying to belittle you.

As an aside, I'm sure you're aware that Enoyis has posted on the boards the official reasons the 5 second rule were put into effect, as follows:

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1) At higher levels spirit regeneration becomes so large it becomes very difficult to balance mana costs of spells against the spirit regen. The regen gets fast enough so that you can regenerate the mana back from a casting in one "tick".

2) The new system differentiates Int from Spirit much more. There are concrete reasons why each is effective in different cases. High spirit is good for long extended fights, Int is better when you want to cast is shorter bursts. Under the old system, all spirit did was in effect extend your mana pool.

3) Spirit used to be so effective as to make the mana efficiency balance of various spells irrelevant. If you rarely run out of mana, then why does it matter to cast a long casting time spell with better mana efficiency?

4) It does add more strategy to how to cast spells. In most fights, you can ignore the 5 second rule, since all that matters is your ability to finish the monster off. In longer fights, you can pace your casting to conserve your mana.

5) Yes, Mages now cannot kill as many monsters over an extended period of time. This is intentional, and brings mages more inline with other classes. Mages can kill monsters much faster than any other class, this is balanced against they have some additional downtime after the fight.

6) We have always intened for every class to spend some time in combat doing non-casting related activities. Casters do decent melee damage and have wands to supplement your casting with. The new system allows you to still burst cast, but there is a penalty attached to this sort of gameplay.

Lastly, we have tested the game pretty extensively using the new rules and are pretty comfortable with how it plays. Please try to adapt, because at this time we do not have any intention of un-doing the change.

Basically you've been arguing along the lines of #2 in this thread. I personally think all of Eno's reasons are ridiculous though. I don't think this method is the proper solution to any of those problems, except maybe #2 insofar as it makes spirit worthless and int all-important, so yes there's a difference between the two.

No MMORPG has mobs that follow every single player rule. Otherwise the game wouldn't be varied, etc. etc. etc. and so forth.

Mobs don't have to follow every player rule, but the new 5 second rule should apply to caster mobs as well. As a lvl 14 mage last night fighting lvl 14 seers I had to use a mana potion each fight or I was dead. The mob regening mana while I'm not is poor design and hopefully Bliz will fix it.

The reason this rule was put in was not to make int more useful in game. Previous puch you could load a mage up with +dam gear and cast rank 1 spells and still do a large amount of damage while expending no mana. Mages were gaining more mana per tick than they were expending. Bliz needs to make +dam gear use a percentage system instead of a flat number (8% instead of +28.)

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"Ahh, and it begins, promises not met to rush the game out...." -Stabbed

"It's the standard Blizzard operating procedure; make something suck, then make a talent to make it suck less." -Gigashadow

Azuarc, Thanks for the post, I hadn't actually seen that official statement on the rule but feel in kind of enforces what I was saying if not 100%, then at least in part.

Right now I'm focusing more on the Hunter and Paladin forum boards, though I was reading the posts about the name change rule and the forced server issues.

I'm planning on running 2 accounts at the same time using the above mentioned classes to duo. While I know every class can solo to varying degrees, I also saw what a difference another person can make in the game, especially when doing certain quests. The reason I chose these classes is I feel there is a good balance of abilities and utility. I know Warrior and Priest is probably a strong pair but would rather avoid it anyway. I could always try it later.

Anyway, I feel this combo is strong because it's like having a group of 3. 2 tanks and the Hunter itself for DPS. The Paladin is a healer too so that's pretty good IMO.

Stumpy, I'm sure you're making a good point but I think I'm missing it. Could you better explain how you feel the 5 second cast rule interacts with the +damage gear? I understand that you're saying mages were regening more mana than they were using, but not getting the connection with the rule. Even if they don't regen mana at all with this change(because of the constant casting they are doing), EVERY other mana using class is actually being hurt more than mages by this change. I don't think the rule was directed specifically at Mages if that's what you're trying to imply.

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I'd challenge you to a battle of witts, but I don't fight unarmed opponents.

The change was directed at damage dealing casters. I would say mage only, but shadow priests had the same advantage. My fire mage had +228 to fire last push. That makes a rank 1 fireball extremely effective. Virtually no casting delay and expending little mana while doing alot of damage. I was almost regening as much mana as I was using every fight.

To those that think this helps in PvP it doesn't. Mages and priests are the first targets in groups. You are normally dead or the "enemy" is dead before you run out of mana. If I'm fighting someone one on one, I never run out of mana.

Fighting elite mobs in a group is where the change hurts most. And yes, you will be fighting alot of them. They are not just in instances. With multiple elites beating on the tank, a priests mana goes fast now. My new mage (made a new one to see the difference) does fine as long as I don't chain cast. The problem comes in when your group is fighting three or more at once. The mage has to let loose or the tank is dead, followed by the priest, and then everyone else.

My views on the change aren't a theory. I've done instances with my 56 mage, 51 priest, and my new 23 mage. My new mage did Chok Sul last night, which is elites but not an instance. We wiped three times due to the priest running out of mana. I spent the last half of almost every battle using a wand waiting for my spells to light up so I could cast again. Party setup:

1) Night Elf Druid - would have rather had a warrior tank, but none available and Bliz says bear form can tank.

2) Dwarf Priest

3) Night Elf Hunter - would have rather had another rogue or another mage, but it's not his fault his class isn't finished

4) Gnome Rogue

5) Gnome Mage - me (Ebu beta 2)

This is not a bad group. I wouldn't go into BRD with this group, but it is effective. Although I would have liked a little different setup, it took 45 minutes to get these people together.

The change doesn't effect other casters as much as it does priests and mages. Hybrid classes can fall back on melee DPS if they run out of mana. The change just increases downtime.

Edited, Mon Sep 27 13:42:57 2004 by StumpyWSF

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"Ahh, and it begins, promises not met to rush the game out...." -Stabbed

"It's the standard Blizzard operating procedure; make something suck, then make a talent to make it suck less." -Gigashadow

Nice job of reading. A druid in bear form is a tank. Blue posts from Bliz have said a druid in bear form can tank. They have tested it internally and it works. If I wanted to wait 2 hours for a defensive warrior, I would have never quit FFXI.

____________________________

"Ahh, and it begins, promises not met to rush the game out...." -Stabbed

"It's the standard Blizzard operating procedure; make something suck, then make a talent to make it suck less." -Gigashadow

I've had time to "adapt" to the changes, and while I am able to play still, I find the game far more annoying. It's not a game so much as a process of mental calculations now as to what I can do now and what would be better waiting more than 5 seconds (which means put it off as long as possible.) This rushing/procrastinating model is making my groups very uncomfortable around me, but it's the way I'm apparently supposed to be playing.

I didn't post here for 3 days because I played all I could before I came back to his topic. You know things are bad when the four instance groups I have been in have all /suggest Bliz change the new 5 second rule. Even the non casters don't like it, because it increases their downtime when grouped.

____________________________

"Ahh, and it begins, promises not met to rush the game out...." -Stabbed

"It's the standard Blizzard operating procedure; make something suck, then make a talent to make it suck less." -Gigashadow

Not sure if you guys read this but this is from Eno, the lead designer of WoW~

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Reasons why the change was made

1) At higher levels spirit regeneration becomes so large it becomes very difficult to balance mana costs of spells against the spirit regen. The regen gets fast enough so that you can regenerate the mana back from a casting in one "tick".

2) The new system differentiates Int from Spirit much more. There are concrete reasons why each is effective in different cases. High spirit is good for long extended fights, Int is better when you want to cast is shorter bursts. Under the old system, all spirit did was in effect extend your mana pool.

3) Spirit used to be so effective as to make the mana efficiency balance of various spells irrelevant. If you rarely run out of mana, then why does it matter to cast a long casting time spell with better mana efficiency?

4) It does add more strategy to how to cast spells. In most fights, you can ignore the 5 second rule, since all that matters is your ability to finish the monster off. In longer fights, you can pace your casting to conserve your mana.

5) Yes, Mages now cannot kill as many monsters over an extended period of time. This is intentional, and brings mages more inline with other classes. Mages can kill monsters much faster than any other class, this is balanced against they have some additional downtime after the fight.

6) We have always intened for every class to spend some time in combat doing non-casting related activities. Casters do decent melee damage and have wands to supplement your casting with. The new system allows you to still burst cast, but there is a penalty attached to this sort of gameplay.

Lastly, we have tested the game pretty extensively using the new rules and are pretty comfortable with how it plays. Please try to adapt, because at this time we do not have any intention of un-doing the change.

-Eno

Now questions arise when it comes to this system: Are you using the proper amount of spirit/intel equipment to increase mana regen and mana itself? Are you using proper food/drink for your level? Do you carry potions and do others? Do you melee? Do you try to avoid chain casting and casting spells not needed? Did you spec yourself with mana related talents?

I'm not accusing anybody of anything here and I have yet to experience anything mid to high level. If you said yes to all of these questions then Blizzard really needs to fix up the 5 second rule but if you avoided something, give it a try now and see if it helps.

Redmoon, you obviously have never played a mage at high level. As to why you posted the infamous Eno garbage post, I have no idea. We are beta testers, we read every Bliz post about a new patch.

Maybe you should go back and reread what I wrote. The majority of high level mages used +dam gear. Mages weren't overpowered solo or in groups before this change. This is the 3rd consecutive patch mages were hurt. Eno's post makes no sense and you would know it if you played the game at high level. Mages are now the only class that has to rest after 2 equal level mobs.

As to the questions you asked. Mages summon food and water, so we always have it. I spent 360g buying int gear for my mage, while pushing his buffed mana pool to over 7k, no help. Mana potions are on a large timer, little help. You try to melee a lvl 50 elite and tell me about the experience. Wands are a joke. As far as using talents goes; I shouldn't have to pick talents to fix my class. Talents are supposed to enhance your class, not make it worth playing.

Mages are the biggest DPS and AoE class in the game. Get into a BRD group and try to not chain cast. After everyone is dead, you can start looking for another group, because that one will boot you.

This isn't just mages "whining" about another nerf. It has made playing a mage unenjoyable and tedious at high level or in groups for elite quests. Anyway, my mage is now benched. Bring on the warlock.

Azuarc, I haven't logged on to my priest much since the patch. I've partied with enough to know better ^^ I feel for you.

Edited, Mon Sep 27 17:38:41 2004 by StumpyWSF

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"Ahh, and it begins, promises not met to rush the game out...." -Stabbed

"It's the standard Blizzard operating procedure; make something suck, then make a talent to make it suck less." -Gigashadow

I think I need to repeat this since I think its worth saying: I do not care what level you are or what you have achieved in the game since it will become mute come retail. I'm only giving insight on this issue by using whatever info is availible to me.

Quote:

Redmoon, you obviously have never played a mage at high level. As to why you posted the infamous Eno garbage post, I have no idea. We are beta testers, we read every Bliz post about a new patch.

Maybe you should go back and reread what I wrote. The majority of high level mages used +dam gear. Mages weren't overpowered solo or in groups before this change. This is the 3rd consecutive patch mages were hurt. Eno's post makes no sense and you would know it if you played the game at high level. Mages are now the only class that has to rest after 2 equal level mobs.

As to the questions you asked. Mages summon food and water, so we always have it. I spent 360g buying int gear for my mage, while pushing his buffed mana pool to over 7k, no help. Mana potions are on a large timer, little help. You try to melee a lvl 50 elite and tell me about the experience. Wands are a joke. As far as using talents goes; I shouldn't have to pick talents to fix my class. Talents are supposed to enhance your class, not make it worth playing.

Mages are the biggest DPS and AoE class in the game. Get into a BRD group and try to not chain cast. After everyone is dead, you can start looking for another group, because that one will boot you.

This isn't just mages "whining" about another nerf. It has made playing a mage unenjoyable and tedious at high level or in groups for elite quests. Anyway, my mage is now benched. Bring on the warlock.

I sense much anger from this post...*brings out a fire extinguisher*

As for stating that Eno's post is garbage, keep in mind that he is the lead designer of the game itself. Whatever he says goes so I take everything he says to heart. Might I also add that the beta test forums is filled with so much whine I could open a bar. Info from devs gets lost in all the mess. Just because a blue tag is on a thread doesn't mean its important info because lately I noticed that Blizzard has been going on the defensive.

Also, you stated something interesting....beta tester. You are not playing the final product and saying the majority use this and the majority use that will matter not. **** by retail mages might turn into nothing more the food/drink creators. All I'm stating is either do one of a few things it you are having problems: Learn to deal with it, try something different from the majority, make a /suggestion or just give up on the class and test something else. Eno stated that he and the team has tested the change, enjoyed it and concluded that this is what the magic system should be like with a little tweak here and there. Now either he's lying or you're missing something. Or maybe the system is just bugged...*shrugs*

As for talents, there are a few abilities that looks like it would help, whether its increasing the dmg output of your wand, increasing mana, or increasing criticals on certain spells. Now whether you took advantage of this is unclear to me. Even though talents as you said are not supposed to make your class worthwhile, they sure do help.

PS: While I won't question your knowledge, its best not to question mines. Also I will say one more thing: I will not listen to people who has problems with their class and complain for fear of bias. Me no like bias *prances around*

Redmoon, thanks for posting that, it does confirm what I was saying as well as what Stumpy was saying.

Mages do seem to be the class that was hurt the most with this change, I'll say that much.

Quote:

Mages are now the only class that has to rest after 2 equal level mobs.

Mages are probably the class that can kill two equal mobs the fastest also. With the downtime I would think the times average out. I did hear of an interesting video on the official site that I haven't been able to open yet where a Warrior was showing how powerful a berserker build could be though(killed mobs and a VERY fast rate). Anyway, my point is that if you dump all your mana very quickly, you'll pay for that having to regen mana. Yes, it's true that that wasn't an issue before, but Mages must be coming off as too powerful.

Warlocks are a class that everyone has been saying needs a lot of work. If you lower the power-level of Mages, suddenly Warlocks don't seem so bad anymore. I'm sure Warlocks will still need some tuning though.

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Mages and priests are the first targets in groups.

With mage's power-levels being tuned down a bit, this might be less of a problem, as they might not be perceived as great of a threat. I know you said Mages weren't over-powered before the patch. But, if they never run out of mana and are the best DPS in the game, as you said, they should be the number one targets.

I don't envy Blizzard the jobs they must do, I just want to be playing the **** game already. :P

Good points though Stumpy. I think we were both right.

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I'd challenge you to a battle of witts, but I don't fight unarmed opponents.

With this change mages have become one of the worst solo classes because of downtime. Warlocks, although they kill slow, can kill mob after mob without resting. You don't really notice the warlocks lack of new pets and unfinished state untill after lvl 30.

As far as being "right," I could really care less. I try to provide opinion backed up by game play experience. Anyone can analyze what they read and imagine how it will play out.

This will actually be my last post about the beta. The stress test was a good thing for Blizzard, and I'm glad more people were able to experience the game. However, unless you reached at least level 40 , maybe higher, you really have no idea how the game truely plays and what talents do and don't do for your class. Anyone with MMO experience knows the early levels are more forgiving and you are just getting a "feel" for how your class plays.

Anyway, it was nice seeing Azuarc didn't like the change much either. I know he has played alot and has experienced both soloing and grouping through the majority of the game. Like I said, every group I have been in, even the melee players dislike this change. Like I said before, do some of the lvl 50+ elite quests and then give your opinion on this change. Nothing like watching every other class kill while you are constantly stopping to drink.

Edited, Mon Sep 27 19:52:47 2004 by StumpyWSF

____________________________

"Ahh, and it begins, promises not met to rush the game out...." -Stabbed

"It's the standard Blizzard operating procedure; make something suck, then make a talent to make it suck less." -Gigashadow

Now questions arise when it comes to this system: Are you using the proper amount of spirit/intel equipment to increase mana regen and mana itself? Are you using proper food/drink for your level? Do you carry potions and do others? Do you melee? Do you try to avoid chain casting and casting spells not needed? Did you spec yourself with mana related talents?

-What is the "proper amount" of spirit/intel equipment? Are you implying that I have crappy gear, or simply am pursuing the absolute wrong gear? I have what I have acquired. That has worked for me up until now. -Food/drink don't help during a fight. That's what this issue is regarding - running out of mana during a fight, or not having the time between fights to sit and eat/drink. Potions are on a two minute reuse timer and aren't incredibly helpful, even if you are an alchemist more skilled than your level would belie. -I melee. I melee constantly, or use my wand. -You have to *TRY TO* chain cast, not avoid it. If I'm going to cast 3 spells in the next 15 seconds, it's best if I can cast them all in a 5 second block so their "downtimes" are overlapping. Of course, then I end up just standing there looking stupid for the other 10. (And getting 3 swings of my staff in.) -I get talents I feel my character should have. When you start requiring people to get certain talents, they have stopped being talents and have become unobvious ways to make your character inferior to everyone else. Talents are supposed to indicate a play preference -- other than competent and efficient vs. unwitting or independent.

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Azuarc, I haven't logged on to my priest much since the patch. I've partied with enough to know better ^^ I feel for you.